


Where He Was

by runsinthefamily



Category: Supernatural
Genre: 8x17, Heaven, M/M, Prayer
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-03-21
Updated: 2013-03-21
Packaged: 2017-12-05 23:43:32
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 346
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/729234
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/runsinthefamily/pseuds/runsinthefamily





	Where He Was

“I can’t.”

Everything is white. Light is everywhere, soothing and holy. It cradles his grace, reminds him of how things used to be, pure and simple and true.

“You can. You must.” Naomi ‘s voice is gentle.

“No.”

He grips the hilt of his sword until the cartilage of his vessel’s knuckles pops and crackles. He looks down into blank green eyes.

“It isn’t him, you know that.”

“I - I know that,” he echoes. Dean would never kneel so calmly, so obediently, in the face of his own death. He reaches out a trembling hand to touch -

“Castiel.” Naomi is firm, unyielding. “Do it.” He voice reverberates through the white, lovely emptiness of the hollow she has brought him to. 

He wants to obey. The Dean before him blinks, slowly.

“Please,” he says.

She waits, patiently. 

_Cas, you got your ears on?_

He lifts his head, breath slipping out. 

“No,” says Naomi. “You can’t leave. You have a task, Castiel.”

“If I complete it -“

“We’ll see.”

_I need you to hear me._

He closes his eyes and brings the blade forward with a jerk. He hears a choked sigh and then the sound of a body falling.

“Good.” Naomi is beside him, one hand on his arm. “Good, Castiel, that was a good beginning.”

_…know that he’s hurting …_

“Open your eyes.”

He opens them. Dean lies at his feet, eyes glazed over, blood running across the floor. No, not Dean. Not!Dean. 

Naomi takes him by the shoulders and turns him and there is Dean, again, kneeling. Dean looks up.

“Cas,” Dean says, without inflection.

“Go on,” says Naomi. “Again.”

“I don’t want to,” he says. He tries to drop the sword but his hand won’t obey him.

“You know it isn’t him,” she says, coaxing. 

_…for all that we’ve been through …_

“And then I can go?”

“We’ll see.”

“Cas,” says the Dean that isn’t Dean.

He stabs it through the heart.

“Good,” says Naomi. She lifts a hand and another Dean appears. This one smiles a little.

_Where are you, man?_

Castiel lifts his sword.


End file.
